I'm not very new to OpenBSD, but this is my 1st installation to the USB-flash.

As I understood from the FAQ (openbsd.org/faq/faq4.html#noflopcd), we have to do the installation for 2 times. The 3rd marker in the list in this FAQ says:

Quote:

Prepare the device on another computer as described in FAQ 14 (openbsd.org/faq/faq14.html#flashmemLive). Boot from it, but chose the bsd.rd kernel, then install as normal

And in that FAQ 14 (openbsd.org/faq/faq14.html#flashmemLive) there's also an install-to-the-USB-process described.

So, I've done everything accroding to the FAQ, but all in vain. (1. prepared the USB. 2.Booted from it using bsd.rd and commited a normal installation)
When the system starts booting from the USB (after the '2nd installation'), then it reboots.

Installing to USB is no different. Instead of specifying the hard drive installed on the system, specify the device node of the USB drive. This means that the USB drive has to be plugged in before booting the install media.

Install as normal, being careful to select your flash drive as the install target.

Boot from your newly created USB device.

When the install script prompts you with the following question (Section 4.5.3):

Quote:

Available disks are: wd0, sd0.
Which one is the root disk? (or 'done') [wd0]

Specify the device node of the USB drive, & continue installation. Given the information above, "wd0" is an IDE drive & "sd0" is most likely the USB drive. USB drives are mounted using the SCSI subsystem, so all USB devices will be mounted as "sdX" where "X" is some numerical value. If you have other SCSI or SATA drives in the system, the device node of the USB drive may not be "sd0". It may be "sd1" or "sd2", etc.. You will simply have to shell out of the install script & look at the dmesg(8) output to determine which device is which.

Once the installation has concluded, reboot. You will need to go into the BIOS setting & ensure that booting continues from the USB drive if you want to boot next into OpenBSD residing on the USB drive. This is possible with most newer motherboards. This may not be an option with older motherboards. You will simply have to look at what settings your BIOS provides in order to figure out whether you can boot from USB devices.

Unfortunately, there is a lot of hype about "live" media especially USB devices. USB drives are simply storage which are attached to the system through a different path than IDE, SATA, or SCSI. Section 14.17.3 simply indicates that the install script is flexible enough to target disks other than whatever is installed as the system's primary storage.

Some more more information may be needed to sort out your The dmesg is a good place to start and if you can record it and post it here all the better. OpenBSD FAQ on saving the dmesg
.

I'm not sure if I can save the dmesg output, because the system reboots rather quickly

ocicat, thanks, but yes - I've read all this from the official FAQ all these instructions about choosing the right node, like sd0 and so on and so forth...

If it's importnat, I did it this way:

1. plugged in my 512 mb Kingston DataTravel
2. switched on my PC. By the way, it has not any HDD drives, only USB-flash
3. installed the system from CD to my USB-flash [sd0]
4. removed the CD, rebooted. I also played with BIOS.

So, the booting started from the USB, but after some dmesg lines my PC rebooted.
I could boot well only with bsd.rd but you understand that this is not actually what I want to have, as it's functionality is not so full as the 'real system' has :-)

PS: and yes.. I think the problem is in my mini-ITX motherboard, because the system is not working well (it restarts on and on...) not only when using USB-boot, but also after connecting a HDD with already well-installed OBSD 4.7 (it worked fine with another motherboard & CPU, not mini-ITX).

The reason shouldn't also be in memory, because yesterday I ran memtest for 5+ hours (from Xubuntu live-CD) and everything was fine.

PS2: just now I tried with NetBSD 5.0.2 (the latest release) and the PC also restarted. On the other hand, Xubuntu 7.10 Live-CD (not new version) started well on my hardware. SLAX Linux also started well yesterday, from a USB-stick.

So, I consider to think that Intel D201GLY2 is not supported yet well enough by Open- and NetBSD (I haven't tried Free-).

That's a pity, but not a real problem. I want to set up a small home server with hosting a tiny website, smtp/pop3 daemons, OpenVPN running on it and also doing NAT for my other home PCs. If *BSD don't support this little motherboard, I'll use SLAX.

...but I see the same in the dmesg(8) on my Thinkpad (which runs OpenBSD well...). Perhaps the output from the bsd.sp or bsd.mp kernels might have indicated more, but unexpected reboots prevented this from happening.

It may be worth doing more memory testing, but memtest must run continuously without interruption. Leaving it for a day may be in order especially if the memory can be replaced.

That ioapic(4) message is quite normal and safe, and most likely not the cause of this issue, it could be faulty memory.. but a system that reboots sporadically would seem to indicate hardware failure or perhaps a dusty CPU heatsink?

It may be worth doing more memory testing, but memtest must run continuously without interruption. Leaving it for a day may be in order especially if the memory can be replaced.

I forgot to mention that the day before yesterday I changed the memory module , but the system still rebooted...

I ran memtest with this 'new' memory, only with it, but it seems not very true to life that each memory module which's plugged into this motherboard appears to be faulty.

I think the reason is this mini-ITX Intel D201GLY2 motherboard (I mean hardware compatability, not it's 'health' in general, because as I've already said, Slax Linux worked fine from the USB-stick).
Has anybody had experience with OpenBSD running on this motherboard?

I googled and as I saw that people had problems while trying to install OpenBSD on this hardware.

Quote:

Originally Posted by BSDfan666

or perhaps a dusty CPU heatsink?

no, it's impossible - the motherboard is absolutely new, it was bought several days ago in the copmuter shop with a good reputation and right after byuing I started to play with it

One more note: my board is Intel D201GLY2A (but it's not too impotant, as D201GLY2 and D201GLY2A are based on the same chipset SiS 662)

I have already installed openbsd 5.0 on an 8g flash .. the process was very easy , ffs (not msdos) and swap double size of ram (4g , in my case )
result : good speed ,, almost no difference from wd0 install ..
of course a flash is fragile and that is why some would advocate using non-journaling .. ext2 or msdos
I treat the installed OS as though it be live so most tasks read-only ..
well

hardware > acer aspire 5610 , 2g ram , 8g flash , ........

I also once installed netbsd 5.1 but prob with acpi amd smp so I would have to disable both ,, choice 4 ..

ps . some problems may be purely physical ,, bad cluster .. bad magic number here or there if not troublesome may become so later as you start writing on fragile poor little flash .. it happened once .. so I avoid too much writing/formatting ..

daemonfowl, recognize that most this thread is over a year & a half old. Most discussions on this site are very timely; most threads over a few weeks ago are most likely finished. If you have new information you would like to present, start a new thread & reference the old.